1913 Barber Half Saved from the Melting Pot...literally! Recommendation appreciated!

Picked up some coins this weekend from a guy that was planning on sending them to the refinery. He had more than I could afford, so I bought the best coins for what I had to spend. In total, he had about 60 Morgans (I only bought 3), and a few dozen 90% halves and commemoratives. He claimed that when he had bought them he was told they were "in a house fire." I tend to believe that some ignorant individual thought they would melt them down on their own but failed miserably. Most of the coins were blackened and many of them had creosote deposit on them.

To my surprise as I searched a stack of halves hidden at the bottom of a bag of Morgans were several Barber halves....including a badly damaged 1913!!! To my excitement I also found a damaged Stone Mountain Commem...I had been wanting one in low condition for a pocket piece. I also saved a badly damaged Lexington Concord commem...they only made 162,000 afterall! In total, I picked up 4 barber halves and the two commems for $12 each,
a damaged barber quarter for $5, and three Morgans for $30 each (yep, a few bucks more than I should have spent).

Melt-wise, the best pick up was a dozen war nickels with a price of 20cents each!


Ordinarily I would never entertain the idea of cleaning a coin, but does anybody have any recommendations or thoughts on a method of removing the creosote from the 1913 Barber Half? Any thoughts on value in its mangled condition? My thought was at least $20.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

If it is indeed creosote that is baked onto those, I doubt there is any solvent that will remove it, including acetone. My friend's shop once bought a bunch of coins that had been in a house fire. They were all MS coins, however, so the cost to send them to NCS for conservation was well worth it, and they came back in excellent condition. You might try acetone, but I'd ask someone with experience using it before hand.
Guy

 

Great Finds! $30.00 for Morgan's is actually a pretty fair price! APMEX is paying about that for them or a little more. I really like the commems personally though!

 

I have used acetone to remove nail polish or glue from a Peace awhile back and had no problems. But it was one I bought for melt and couldn't lose on. Cannot imagine why you would melt the mid-grade Morgans though, not worth it IMHO. Plus they are already in a convenient and historical bullion form.

 

Great job saving those, especially those commems. They don't deserve to be melted!